


Preparations

by wreathed



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Blow Jobs, Canon Era, M/M, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Shame
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-31
Updated: 2020-05-31
Packaged: 2021-03-03 06:55:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24466819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wreathed/pseuds/wreathed
Summary: Edward has spent a great more time alone with Fitzjames as of late: first as a spectre of disappointment as Terror’s unanticipated command meeting representative in their expedition leader’s absence — back before either of them had witnessed Crozier’s rock bottom state and his avowal to dig no further down into something worse — then as the expedition’s temporary second-in-command.
Relationships: Commander James Fitzjames/Lt Edward Little
Comments: 16
Kudos: 41





	Preparations

“Care for a drink, Edward?” Fitzjames asks, at last putting out of sight the chart they had been poring over. He stands up rather abruptly, and so Edward stands too, one hand behind as is proper. It would be inappropriate to leave Fitzjames to tower above him.

“No thank you, sir,” Edward replies, mindful of the whisky he had been ordered to have relieved Fitzjames of already. 

“I have already bade you sit, and to cease standing on ceremony during our command meetings,” Fitzjames says, as if Edward taking pains to adhere to protocol and demonstrate the appropriate amount of deference due is a mysterious affront to him, and Edward, feeling once more out of place, ungainly takes his chair once again.

Edward assumes that Fitzjames has stood to ring for Hoar, but instead his gloveless hand reaches to a wooden shelf and curves elegantly around a cut glass tumbler. His nails, Edward sees as he watches Fitzjames’s movement, remain notably neat and even. Edward wonders — out here, the impending spring expected to bring an upending of their monotonous routine in one way or another — as to the level of empowering, civilising purpose Fitzjames still finds in maintaining the gently waved hair, the fashionably narrow line of his waist at the hem of the gansey (his waist at present being right at Edward’s eye line, mounted on Fitzjames’s long legs), the shine of his double rows of gold buttons glinting in the light of the low-hanging lamp. He knows there are the men to think of, but he is the only man here.

Edward sees how Fitzjames looks now, surprisingly unchanged from how he looked at the very start of their voyage: with his greatcoat, epaulettes and bicorn added, he would look like a handsome young captain painted into a storybook. Captain Crozier is on another ship entirely and abed, wretched; entirely unable to sit for any portrait for polite company.

Fitzjames takes his seat again, then takes a single sip of the amber liquid he has poured for himself, only to appear to immediately to change his mind upon this momentary taste. He places the glass back down and does not take it up again.

They are both thinking of him, then.

Then there is their usual moment of stilted silence that Edward does not attempt to fill; not silence, strictly speaking, rather no words spoken between them, for they are surrounded by the sounds of men stomping, talking, hanging their hammocks through an overfull ship. Fitzjames prefers the company of a wider audience, Edward expects, for his Chingkiang story and others besides, and due to Erebus’s misfortunes the only other commissioned officer aboard for some time would have been Le Vesconte — who has heard those tales with even more regularity than the rest of them. Now Erebus is packed to the rafters with men and supplies, and footsteps on Terror echo in the quiet.

It is all well updating each other on the state of the ice, or the latest weather readings. To have the tentative beginnings of a conversation Edward does not wish to give his full analysis about how many statute miles it is from here to Great Slave Lake. But now their meeting has ended. Is Edward expected to stay to socialise when there is not another soul to witness it, when only one of them, now it seems neither of them, are taking a drink as offered? 

Fitzjames has never offered him a drink before. They have no further pre-set set of topics to proceed through. Yet even in this ostensible loosening of formality, their stations remain. Edward cannot bring himself to request to be dismissed.

Edward has heard many entertaining stories about Fitzjames, generally from his own mouth. It was the stories Fitzjames does not tell that he has the most interest in.

Formerly only one of several faces around the wardroom table listening attentively to Fitzjames’s valorous yarns, Edward has spent a great more time alone with Fitzjames as of late: first as a spectre of disappointment as Terror’s unanticipated command meeting representative in their expedition leader’s absence — back before either of them had witnessed Crozier’s rock bottom state and his avowal to dig no further down into something worse — then as the expedition’s temporary second-in-command during this, the captain’s unofficial leave of absence. 

It is nearing the end of the working day, but that means little during polar night. At least there will always be the bells.

“Do not look so glum, lieutenant. It does not become you,” Fitzjames says, looking right at him, his hands entirely empty and spread out against the table, and Edward does not have a response he can select from the catalogue in his head he feels is appropriate for that.

“Sir,” he manages, in lieu of anything better. His shoulders stiffen, and he suspects with a fall of his insides that Fitzjames will notice.

Edward had removed his slops upon arrival on Erebus, but has not peeled away the dark wool confines of his coat any more than to unbutton it. He is finding the bright cream-white colour of Fitzjames’s waistcoat and the wool underneath it uncomfortable to look at. Was there any possible prospect that the man could feel overwarm enough to forgo an additional layer? Fitzjames does not seem so foppish to Edward these days, despite Fitzjames’s best efforts to retain such a reputation. He knew, or had learned over the course of their stationary voyage, a great deal about magnetics. Perhaps they could talk about that. Fitzjames also knew how to make best efforts to inspire robust spirits amongst the rank and file, a skill at which Edward knew his attempts remained maladroit. 

Fitzjames grins — perhaps he has seen something damnably amusing in Edward’s averted eyes — and pushes the glass of whisky towards Edward, next raising his hand and hitting a hearty, good-natured fist against Edward’s chest. The table is small enough, or perhaps Fitzjames’s legs are long enough, that their knees knock together as if the ship is still afloat. In combination, it is the most Edward has been touched by anyone in some time.

Crozier and Fitzjames are such different men. No wonder they haven’t taken to each other.

Fitzjames feels it his reflexive duty, Edward supposes, to boost morale whether there are one or one hundred men present, and so Edward, still counting as one whole man for the time being, nevertheless gets the treatment. As though he can buoy up Edward’s mood through innocuous force, as though they are two wickets down on a sunny English village green rather than stuck far from home for an age, hoping that rescue reaches them before they reach the bare floor of the food stores. 

Edward realises with a sharp flush of mortification that he is now able to look at Fitzjames directly, and has indeed been doing so for several moments longer than would be usual. Fitzjames’s eyes are dark. It highlights the sharpness of his face. You could paint it. You could paint onto it. Canvas takes the colour it’s been given.

“It’s capital stuff,” Fitzjames says, his voice surprisingly quiet and low, and Edward’s hand twists against the fabric of his trousers at the inner edge of his thigh. Their knees meet for a second time with an inappropriate jolt. There is a nod forward of Fitzjames’s head. “The whisky.”

“Oh,” Edward replies, open-mouthed before remembering himself. “I don’t doubt it, sir. Hodgson regularly commends your good taste when it comes to the epicurean.”

In the end, Edward looks down at the offered glass and finds he cannot bear to decline again, and so takes a mouthful out of courtesy. It’s smooth and tastes well, although it still burns the back of his throat once swallowed. Not stolen, this time, but gifted freely. The remaining bottles lined up on the shelf remind him of Crozier, but the taste in his mouth does not.

“Do you remember your interview for this expedition?” Fitzjames asks.

Edward did. Fitzjames had been notably handsome on that day, too, in full dress uniform. Fitzjames had asked Edward about his father, and had seemed to approve when Edward had also taken the opportunity to detail the dependable genealogy of his family back far further. He had correctly supposed that Fitzjames was the type who would approve of Edward’s highly bucolic sort of upbringing.

“You were of a lighter mood, then,” Fitzjames suggests. “You seemed to wish to endear yourself to command.”

“I desperately needed to be taken on,” Edward admits. “I had been on half pay for over a year.”

“Let us agree for that not to be the last ever time you indulge me,” Fitzjames says, and Edward, caught out by how their conversation still insists on circling away from firm meanings he can grasp easily, nods.

Fitzjames stands once again, stepping away from his pushed-back chair so that he is all but by Edward’s side, and Edward rises yet again out of instinct, hand behind him at the waist. Their faces are unusually close together, and he takes in all the lines of Fitzjames’s face. Their conversation, he presumes, is over, although this is a strange point at which to end it.

He realises his mistake when his gaze falls across the purse of Fitzjames’s lips, as if he is biting the inside of his mouth; an unusual counterpoint to the slight colour in his cheeks.

“Stay where you are put, lieutenant. I have already requested it,” Fitzjames says from beside him, eyes so dark still, and Edward gapes in shock when Fitzjames grasps both of Edward’s thighs and pushes him back down that way. Edward crumples back into the chair easily. Too easily. “I will not tell you again.”

The new warmth to Edward’s body, once from the whisky, is not in his mouth anymore. His coat is unfastened — a tactical error — and does not hide the evidence. He prays for the lamp to go out, to be left entirely in shadow.

Momentarily looking as though he is concerned he has showed too much of himself, Fitzjames blinks down at him. Edward hears himself about to hoarsely voice the most humiliated of apologies, his whole face red, as Fitzjames steps away to depart his own great cabin.

From behind him, he instead hears the sound of Fitzjames turning the lock in the door

When Fitzjames returns to where Edward sits frozen still in heart-beating humiliation, Fitzjames swallows once, then sinks straight to his knees on the hard floor.

“Sir,” Edward says, feeling his head go light. He is to fight against both the urge of his body and the urge to follow whatever command requests of him; the effort makes his thoughts swim. “Forgive me, sir, but: you head this expedition at present. Must we not lead by example?”

“Who would know,” Fitzjames replies dully, his long fingers at the placket of Edward’s trousers, his other hand enveloping the clenched fist that Edward still holds behind him. Edward groans and breathes out hard as he scrunches his eyes closed then open, his bearings left in disarray. The room seems too bright; his skin sweats and tingles at the back of his knees. The unrelenting interest of his long-ignored prick is unconscionable.

Even as Fitzjames handles Edward so purposefully, he looks distracted by his own sorrow, and it is a glimpse for Edward into all the fear he might be hiding behind good cheer. “Francis would not know at present if something happened three feet from his face, he is so insensible.”

The statement, plainly put, makes a blur of dampness prickle at the edges of Edward’s eyes. He had not expected it.

Fitzjames’s hand has opened his trousers directly and reached the aching want of him, pulling his red and solid length from his woollen drawers. His legs fall open further of their own accord and his hips hitch forward, causing an over-insistent push into Fitzjames’s wily grip that makes the heel of his boot knock loudly against the leg of the chair. He has to gasp in a deep breath to try and ground himself enough to be able to reply. Fitzjames removes his grasp, leaving him pathetically exposed and wanting.

“He will come through it, I am sure of it,” he tells Fitzjames. “I am on Captain Crozier’s side, but you have me on your side also, sir. Please. There needn’t remain any factional sentiment, not now.”

An image flashes momentarily, uninvited, into Edward’s mind of the captain’s pistol where he has left it out: in the middle of the desk in his tiny cabin, lying loaded and on its side. Abandoned but still with power; temporarily removed from its owner.

“I am sure of it,” Edward repeats. “Jopson does not let me in to see,” Edward says. Fitzjames’s own gun will be somewhere in this room, but he can’t see where it is.

“Nor I,” Fitzjames admits, and scrunches his mouth into an odd kind of smile.

They stick to this wry tableau, Fitzjames’s hand now resting at the top of Edward’s thigh, the other remaining intimately clasped around Edward’s fist where it is wrenched behind him. Edward looks down at himself, teeth gritted. He realises with a sudden jolt that he has no sight as to the state of Fitzjames, nor has he especially thought of it until now.

The ostensible loosening of formality. Their respective stations. Edward cannot bring himself to request that Fitzjames move his hand back to where it had been a few moments ago.

“Forgive me,” Fitzjames says uncertainly, and his left hand tightens around Edward’s one held at his back as he tilts his head forward and takes Edward in his hot, delicate mouth.

Edward wishes he could decline to commit to memory the quiver of his thighs and the choked-off sound he makes.

Fitzjames moves so that his mouth is at the very end of him, the air cool at Edward’s re-exposed length. Edward grunts from a closed mouth; Fitzjames closes his eyes as if he is deep in prayer. Edward watches the flare of Fitzjames’s lips tight around his prickhead, his tongue nestled happily against the leaking tip. The lamplight picks out a smear of spit that has run down his chin.

The idea that Fitzjames would do this is absurd; the more senior navy man coerces their junior into service — that is how things go. It was not an experience unknown to him when he was fresh-faced and serving in warmer climes, days now long gone. It seems unnatural that Fitzjames looks like he belongs where he is.

“Let me, at least — some linens on the ground, or a bolster for your knees, sir.”

The comment does not bring Fitzjames to a halt. He simply continues. He makes hussy-like sounds with his mouth tight around Edward’s cock, and his long, soft hair falls over his face. Fitzjames’s whole body shakes with the pleasure of it. If he were to half-close his eyes, Edward could pretend it is a woman down there servicing him. He does not want to.

The singular attention is agonising. Part of him hopes that Fitzjames never so much as glances at him ever again; he could not bear the scrutiny if anyone were to be around to see it.

“Ah,” Edward says. He had meant to say more, but words at this exact moment seem like a distant concept. “Christ.”

Edward isn’t sure if it is more impolite to look down and watch, acknowledge so openly, or look to the overhead and act as though blind to proceedings — or, worse, to imply that the sight and action did not please him. Yet he feared if he looked back down too closely at where Fitzjames knelt between his legs, the risk would be that the sight would please him _too_ greatly.

His free arm flops back by his side. He is no good at controlling himself. _Close_. He’s close. He can hear all the sounds of the teeming ship around them, muffled but ever-present.

Seeking an urgent solution, he rips at the fastening at the back of Fitzjames’s neck and grabs the perfect dark silk of his neck stock, pulling it all away so he can stuff it in his own hopeless mouth. He’s treated when he does so to the sight of Fitzjames’s eyes wild from such insubordination, of sweat shining against Fitzjames’s pale neck and, further below that, Fitzjames ardently tugging at himself between his kneeling legs as he sucks, so hot and damp.

Edward gives no warning when he spends. He moans aloud, all muffled by the silk, looking down in disbelief at how deep he is in Fitzjames’s mouth, watching with wide eyes as his copious completion pulses against the clench of Fitzjames’s eager throat. A moment later, when Edward’s prick is turning over-sensitive and beginning to soften, Fitzjames tightly squeezes Edward’s hand and make a single, low, satisfied sound, his mouth still full, as he finishes from his own attentions. Some of Edward’s spend bubbles out of Fitzjames’s mouth as Fitzjames finally withdraws. A wet strand of it follows him before breaking off and ruining his face in a manner Edward finds mortifyingly thrilling.

Remembering himself, he unstuffs his own mouth, shocked by how he has needlessly ruined this item of Fitzjames’s clothing, and hears himself apologise profusely. Fitzjames looks up at him from the floor, still kneeling between Edward’s boots, but he only shakes his head in response to Edward’s protestations. He doesn’t allow for there to be anything further said on it.

“It will not be long before we shall see the sun again,” Fitzjames says, after there has been some time to put themselves back together in silence. “I had wondered whether the men should be given some sort of chance at celebration. We have had little chance to properly acknowledge Christmas this year, after all.”

“A celebration, sir,” Edward says, watching Fitzjames reach for the door handle. He thought about where that hand had been but ten minutes before. He thought about Fitzjames’s unvoiced stories. “We will have to be careful. But there’s something to be said for it.”

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [tumblr](http://wreathedwith.tumblr.com/).


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